


Fire and Brimstone

by illyriantremors



Category: A Court of Thorns and Roses Series - Sarah J. Maas
Genre: ACOTAR - Freeform, Angst, Comfort, F/M, NSFW, Oral Sex, Smut, acomaf, mostly angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-10
Updated: 2016-10-10
Packaged: 2018-08-20 15:19:34
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8253746
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/illyriantremors/pseuds/illyriantremors
Summary: In his desperation, Cassian goes into the Illyrian mountains in search of a hot spring that could help his wings finish healing and Nesta gets dragged along with him. They both end up taking some chances with each other emotionally and physically along the way.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This isn’t really the Nesta we currently know. I’d like to think that once Nesta realizes being fae can give her emotions the agency they need to control her life, she’ll calm down a little. She’s still snarky and pissed off here, but she’s also coming to terms with a lot of baggage, so she’s more the Nesta I’m hoping we’ll end up with in Book 3 - aka one who isn’t quite so mean all the time.

“It’s a spa.”

“It’s a geothermic pool in the ground brimming with sulfur and minerals that are good for the skin and known to be purifying to bodily toxins.”

I stared at the steam rising from the _geothermic pools_ and called bullshit. “It’s a spa.”

Cassian scowled. “Call it whatever you want, sweetheart. It wasn’t my choice to drag you here. You can leave whenever you want, although I know you’re dying to see me with my shirt off in all my bandaged, bruised glory.”

In light of what had happened to Cassian’s wings, his humor had turned from an arrogant bravado bordering on sultry to a self-deprecating brand I wasn’t quite sure how to cut. The implications of it, however, still pissed me off.

“No thanks,” I replied. “Ugly and bandaged brutes aren’t quite my thing.”

Cassian was silent and I waited for his wings to ruffle, as much as a membranous wing could, but there was no movement as there should have been.

He was almost healed. The healers were ready to clear him, but insisted he still needed time. Morrigan had suggested the hot springs arguing the heat and minerals in the waters might give his wings the final bit of the puzzle they needed to fully heal. Cassian left the very next morning and with most of the inner circle off in this court or that, I was the only one around with nothing better to do than go with him.

Even Elain was busy working for Rhys, pulling strings on that red-head’s back. I shuddered just thinking about it, but forced my hands to relax the flex my knuckles had worked in to. I had to try. I had to keep learning to let go.

“Well go on,” I snapped. Cassian jerked his head. He had been sitting on the banks of the pool for far too long. “I’m pretty sure it’s not going to heal you if you just make goo-goo eyes at it.”

Nothing.

“Come on,” I said, stomping up to him and latching on to his arm, trying to drag him in clothes and all. “Stop being a little bitch about it and get in.”

Cassian yanked his arm back and a near-growl rose in his chest. “I’m not ready.”

“Why? It’s just water. Don’t tell me you dragged me all the way up to these ridiculous mountains of idiotic mongrels just to show me the scenery. Mother, this is a waste of time.”

“Are you always so insane?!”

“Yes! _Now get in the blasted water!_ ”

“No.”

“Why not?!”

_“Because it’s going to hurt!”_

I froze _._

Cassian stood to face me. “Do you realize what sulfur is going to feel like, Nesta?” His voice was even. I didn’t know whether to be pleased or very, very scared. “It’s going to help, but before it helps, it’s going to burn. _A lot_. So excuse me if I decide to park my pansy ass on the sideline for a moment before I rip my wings all over again.”

Somehow, I managed not to roll my eyes at him. He _was_ being a pansy ass. I got it, I really did. This was going to hurt, but after all the fuss made about these damned wings, I would have been chomping at the bit to do anything within my power to fix them had they been mine. So I didn’t understand all the delay.

This wasn’t the Cassian I’d grown accustomed to, the one who’d call me out for mistreating my sister growing up or challenged me to take control of my own life. This wasn’t the man I was starting to feel some kind of _thing_ for. I blanched at the thought.

“I’ll go with you.”

Cassian had turned his back on me by now, but his head twisted to the side as if he might spot me in his periphery. “What?”

“I said, moron, that I’ll go with you. Hold your hand? Give you a gold star when you’re done? The whole nine yards. Whatever. Just...” I sighed, trying not to lose the hold on my voice before I became completely exasperated. “Get in the water already, Cassian. Please?”

He turned around and the weight bogging down his eyes was incredible. It must have filled his pockets with lead because still he didn’t move and it pissed me off even more. This was going to work. _It had to_.

“Fine.” I stormed toward the shoreline of the hot spring, stripping my top as I went.

“What are you-”

“If you’re not going to enjoy the burn, then I will!” I peeled my pants off, a loose flowing set that seemed to be the aesthetic in Velaris fashion, and left them in the dirt. I glanced over my shoulder, eyes blazing. “Still gonna sit this one out?” Cassian crossed his arms, grimacing, but I noticed his eyes give my body a once-over.

Sucker.

“Fine,” I shrugged. “Suit yourself. More for me to enjoy.” And with that, I unhooked my bra, tossed it over my shoulder making sure it would land at Cassian’s feet and walked briskly into the hot spring. The water felt almost as hot as Cassian’s cheeks which I hoped dearly were burning as they watched me strut in.

The water was fairly shallow, enough that I could get out into the middle of the spring and still touch the bottom with plenty of room. I waded out and stood so that the tops of my breasts almost peaked out, but I knew it wouldn’t be enough for him to see through the milky film of the water. He’d have to come closer and earn it if he wanted that much.

I whistled nice and long and low. “Feels gre-ay-t,” I said putting a little extra heat into my words. Cassian’s hands had slackened to his sides while he watched me and tried to keep his jaw off the floor.

I swiveled entertaining a smug smirk on my face and stood full up out of the water so that my hair dripped down my bare back. Not two seconds later, I heard him move as he began to strip off his clothes and I began to wonder exactly how much he would take off. My face was suddenly very warm and not from the hot spring.

Cassian was silent walking in. I pretended to ignore him, still keeping my back turned lest he lose motivation, but when he hissed violently, I knew the first inches of his wings had hit the water and enough of him was covered that I could turn around.

His face was unbearable and oddly enough, I wanted to do something about it. I didn’t like seeing it written in pain rather than charm and ease. Bring back the old, normal Cassian - that’s what I wanted and then maybe it would be easier to go back to hating him again.

And his wings. His wings were all wrong. His body struggled to arch them high and avoid the liquid fire below, but bloodied and bruised, there was only so much the muscles could work on his frame. He’d have to step out entirely if he wished to avoid wetting them altogether and I couldn’t stand that he would miss out on the opportunity to heal.

It just wasn’t Cassian to do that. Cassian always fought. He’d more than shown me that much and it was what he reminded me to do on a near daily basis. But now that the tables were turned on him, he couldn’t take it? Fuck that.

I knew better than anyone that life was hard. My parents made me out of granite and steel and then the Cauldron decided adding ice and lightning would be a good idea. I knew all about hard and how to fight it, escape it. And right now, Cassian wanted to fight, but he was too scared to do it even though we were made of the same material. That didn’t sit right with me.

“All at once, sweetheart,” I called, teasing him with his ridiculous moniker. “Best to just dive in and get it over with.”

When his gaze met mine, I saw genuine fear and his fear scared me endlessly. With more daring than I felt, I walked toward him, aware my chest was more and more bared to him with each step, until I was within reach of his hands. Taking them in my own, Cassian’s skin shivered. It was peculiar to see the war hero wince like that.

I took a step back, just one, and after several heartbeats, Cassian took one step forward. His gaze was nowhere near my breasts. The bottom tips of his wings met the sulfurous water and he groaned, not pleasantly in the slightest, but given a moment to adjust he relaxed again.

“See? Not so bad.”

One step back.

One step forward.

Another hiss.

One step back.

One step forward.

A sigh.

One step back.

Two steps forward.

A groan, this time slightly pleasant. His wings were half-covered in water.

One step back.

Many steps forward.

Tension, and then the most beautiful, relaxed smile I had ever seen as Cassian went on his back, scrunched his eyes together, and floated his wings through the healing water. My heart had never been so relieved since they pulled Elain out of the Cauldron alive.

I waded next to him staring up at the sun. It was a duller sunlight here in the mountains. Perhaps the hot springs brought enough heat that it wasn’t necessary to have the orb bearing down all its power. Maybe, I thought stupidly, Cassian stole all the warmth when he came here to train as a kid and that’s where it went, into the man floating next to me.

His fingers brushed my thigh and I jumped, thinking they were something else in the water. Cassian opened one eye in a squint and chuckled at me before shutting it again.

“How’d you know?”

“How’d I know what?”

“That I could take it.”

I furrowed my brow. “Oh please. You’ve survived far worse than this, I’m sure.”

“Yes, but some scars hurt worse than others.” His hand found my thigh again and gave a little squeeze and I knew we were both thinking about the same thing, that day I’d been dragged into Hybern’s court and watched as Cassian was torn to pieces while the rest of my life exploded in my face.

His life had exploded too. Not just his wings, but his court. He hadn’t even realized Feyre was no longer with her mate until he’d woken up and that had been days later. He was furious when he found out. Yet even then, he’d had the passion to push through it and deal with my torments on top of it.

“You’re fire made flesh,” I said nonchalantly, as if it were the simplest fact in the universe. “Of course you could stand a little burn.”

Cassian smiled and there it was again, that little pitter-patter in my chest that sped up every time he looked at me like he could see beyond my exterior shell, down to the very brittle bones of my body and soul where I hid away from the world. His hand dared to inch a little higher on my thigh and I was about to move away, to snap my lid back down and clamp it tight. He knew I was going to. He expected it. But I remembered the way his hand had reached for me when I came out of that cauldron, the strangled sound of my name on his lips when he should have been concerned about _anything_ other than me in that moment. That exact moment had been plaguing me for weeks.

And it was with that thought in mind that I decided that today, I wouldn’t shut the lid on who I was. I wouldn’t let the heat constantly festering in me to turn to anger when it could be something else. This time I wouldn’t hide away from the world and right now, the entire world felt like him.

_Cassian_.

He’d told me repeatedly to take chances and he meant it just as much for my mind and emotions as he did my new fae body. So why not snatch one of those chances now? It was what he’d wanted, right?

Cassian lifted a brow when I didn’t recoil. I gave him a hard, piercing look, daring him to see if he had the balls to go a little higher and he did, stopping when he reached the only article of clothing I hadn’t removed.

He snuck a thumb underneath the hem, but I stopped him. “Ah-ah,” I said. “Age before beauty.” Cassian snorted, but just as I’d suspected, he took his hands away to remove the underwear he’d left on, probably for my benefit, the stupid lionheart.

“What are you doing?” he asked when I stole them out of his hand before he could toss them back to the shore. I forced him to turn around until his back was to me with his wings spread wide, then I bent down and dragged the garment in the mud on the floor of the spring where I knew the healing minerals his wings needed would be the richest.

The moan that came out of Cassian’s mouth when I rubbed the cloth over his wings - gingerly of course - wasn’t human. His wings went razor sharp at the touch, a bit like they used to before they’d torn, but his body trembled. I almost worried he’d fall over and I’d have to catch him, he shook so badly. But the wings - they moved with a sharpness I hadn’t seen since before Hybern.

He got better with each touch, though I could see the flex in his shoulder muscles as I washed his wings telling me it was all he could do not to lose control. Right as I was beginning to worry it would be too much, that maybe this was harming him more than helping, he groaned and my name swam off his lips in such desperate search of salvation. He wasn’t in pain. The stupid dumbass was _enjoying_ my touch. And I kind of liked it. Heat pooled in my crotch and I knew I could towel off all I wanted it and it wouldn’t stop the wetness from coming.

I stared at the wings as I watched. There was color in the membranes I’d never spotted before. Feyre had told me Rhys’s wings made her want to paint them like nothing else before, but I never understood the call in her blood for it. Wings were wings, however different or large.

The color of Cassian’s wings changed that. I had always thought them a deep pitch of black, but with the sunlight peaking even blandly through the steam, little spots of reds and yellows shone through. Even the blood of his veins flowed with a molten tone that was gold and orange all at once. Maybe he really was made of fire.

And then there were the bruises. Great big patches of destruction and anger blotting the near perfect canvas. They ruined him with their mottled greens and unnatural blues. Who ever thought those two colors could be unnatural, but somehow on Cassian they were.

My fingers brushed over some of the bruises, tracing them as if I could will them to go away, and Cassian shuddered. I hadn’t realized how close I’d stepped up to him in my distraction with the colors of him nor that I’d stopped my movements with the cloth. I think it surprised us both.

“Why’d you stop, sweetheart?” Cassian said, his voice unsure and shaky.

“I just...” I paused, no longer really certain what I was doing or where this was going. All I knew was one simple thing and so I said it before I could change my mind because someone once told me to try taking chances more often and I needed it to work. “I just wanted to fix you.”

His knuckles reconnected with my thigh and I felt a lazy caress. Cassian seemed incapable of speech. But the light pressure on my thigh told me enough, a silent thank you for getting him through the day.

I tested a finger on the membranes of his wing, tracing a line of gold. His body tensed again and I wondered what made this touch so different from the one with the cloth. What made any of the touches different - flesh, wind, cloth, bed, chair, water? The more I thought about it, the more I realized what a marvel his wings were. What a marvel _he_ was.

Any of them for that matter. Was this how Feyre felt every time she touched Rhys? Like the world was going to end and somehow that was okay? Did Rhys tremble when she touched him like it might kill him and in doing so somehow save him too?

This horrible monster of jealousy I’d carried all my life suddenly reared up inside of me because once again, my sister had something I wanted. When we were younger and I’d failed her, it was sheer will that she possessed, a will to see us through anything. And I had wanted that. My will had always been emotional, an ability to stay away and protect myself, but hers turned emotions into actions and made surviving possible. I had secretly hoarded a desire for that ability for years until Feyre left us, but when she came back she brought all these new things for me to envy that went beyond skills and in to people and I had no way to understand how to get them.

Everything about my sister seemed unattainable. It’s why I loathed her for so long and treated her like less than dirt. She knew how to be something I never could be. Right here, right now, with Cassian literally at my fingertips, I realized I still didn’t know how to make my wants reality. I felt broken by my own self-defeat.

“What happened?” Cassian said. The spark was gone and he knew it. “Nesta,” he said again, though he didn’t turn. Only moved his knuckles over my thigh in an increasingly soothing gesture. “What happened, sweetheart?”

His voice brought me back. I wanted to bite at him and shove it all away, but instead, I took a deep breath. Chances. Cassian wanted me to take chances when I was afraid or hurting. He told me it would make the world a little easier to deal with and I didn’t see how, but if I wanted to break through this stupid wall I’d built inside myself - and cauldron, did I ever - I had to keep taking chances.

So even though I was scared out of my mind this would all be too much and he would laugh in my face even when I knew he never would over something so personal and private as this moment, I took a deep breath and moved as close to him as I could without our bodies actually touching.

“I was just thinking that you make me want to be a better person.” Cassian closed his eyes and hummed low in his throat. His head tilted back and came to rest on my chest.

“You already are a better person, Nesta,” he replied. “You just never realized it.”

He opened his eyes and stared up as much as he could at me. Hazel. His eyes were hazel. The only green and brown part of him I could accept as being as natural and warm as the fire on his wings. My fingers slid up to the wetness of his hair and scrubbed through the tendrils massaging his scalp. Lazily, his eyes closed again.

His knuckles, however, continued to brush over my thigh and when they rose a little higher, he paused just as he had the first time, a silent question. I didn’t say anything, but my fingers applied a little extra pressure against his scalp and after a moment, his hand had found its way to the hemline of my underwear once more.

“I believe it’s your turn,” he said. There was snark there, but there was also enough lightness that I could say no and he wouldn’t stop me, wouldn’t throw it back in my face.

Chances.

Slowly, I removed my hands from his head. I flexed them, rubbing my fingers together to relieve some of the tension I felt building up in my stomach, and then reached down into the water and slid my underwear off. Cassian smiled, his eyes still closed as he leaned into my chest.

I balled the underwear up and cocked my hand back ready to throw them off into the bowels of the hot spring, never to be seen again, but as my hand went forward, Cassian caught hold of my wrist and stopped me.

“What the h-” I started to yell at him, but then his head tilted to the side and he pulled my hand toward him and suddenly he was leaning into the ball of my underwear, burying his nose in the delicate fabric. I felt his body shift underneath the water, his chest expanding and contracting.

_He was smelling me_.

Through the sulfur and the heat, Cassian was scenting me on the fabric somehow.

“Isn’t that somewhat disgusting?” I asked, knowing how much filth had to have collected on them, but even as I said it, I could feel my voice quivering with the heat flooding my body. “How is it possible you... how can you even...”

Cassian turned out from my underwear just enough that I could see him grin wickedly. “Sweetheart, you’re wet enough that I could have scented you   
through a thunderstorm.” He pressed his nose back in again and inhaled deeply. When he spoke next, his voice grew thick and husky like it was a struggle to speak. “Or through a hurricane.”

Finally, he pulled back and away enough to open his eyes and look properly at me. I instantly missed the feel of his head against my chest, but there was enough heat coiling between my legs to replace it that I didn’t notice the absence for long.

He turned around completely, our bodies facing each other naked beneath the surface of the water, and he stared at me with such a feral look on his face of desire and longing. Again, I thought stupidly of my sister. Was this how Rhysand looked at her? Did he make her feel like the only woman alive big enough to satisfy his appetite for life and love? Because that was how I felt with Cassian looking at me like that. Like I was the only thing that existed, the match to set him ablaze, the hurricane and the storm that called to him.

My toes curled in to the sand at my feet and I instinctively leaned forward, my hands almost touching him. Behind him, Cassian’s wings flared as soon as my body had moved.

“It’s that obvious, huh?” I said and Cassian’s brow quirked. Stepping up to him so that we were nearly pressed together, I ran two of my fingers up his chest in a tantalizing walk on his skin and whispered, “What ya gonna do about it?”

Cassian snorted, but before I could connect our skin the way I’d wanted, Cassian had disappeared on me, diving into the water wings and all. The next thing I knew, he’d spread my legs and pulled them over either of his shoulders and brought himself to stand straight out of the water, my crotch inches from his face.

His hands went immediately around my waist and down to my rear, grabbing and pushing it up just enough that my hips lifted and then his tongue tasted me and I discovered what fire felt like.

The burn was everything. His lips kissed me with the fires of hell and I thought I might never get out, I was damned for all eternity with him on me. Steam from the hot spring rose high enough to lick my legs dangling over his back and I tried not to shake, lest he lose his hold and I fell.

But his hands gripped me powerfully, his arms squeezing against my thighs and I knew falling was an impossibility with Cassian. That’s when I realized he would never let me go, never let me drown in that hurricane or get lost in the storm. Everywhere he would find me and fish me back out by scent or touch or whatever damned means he needed to get to me.

My fingers wove into his hair and gripped as the most wonderful sensation filled me. Fire, I found out, felt _good_. More than good. It was dangerously exquisite. And I wanted more. My hips pressed as much as they could into Cassian’s mouth and he snarled against me, his tongue lashing out to burn between my folds and back up to circle my clit.

“Cassian,” I groaned, my back starting to arch, but still his strong hands held me ever tighter. “Oh, _Cassian.”  
_

My hips wanted more and in pressing in, my legs met his back more and I had _just_ enough room... that I ran my toes along the rim of his wings and he sent the ensuing spasm into his lips, trembling against me.

Chances. I took a chance and then I broke. My fingers fisted tightly in his hair, one hand sliding down to dig at the skin of his neck as the waves of ecstasy washed over me melting the ice and the lightning away. When he’d licked me through the last of it, I felt myself start to collapse and then my body really did fall.

Cassian felt me give out and scooped me off his shoulders and into his arms, carrying me in his embrace toward the shore. I caught a glance at his crotch as he did so and decided I very much liked what I saw. But that would be an adventure for another day.

“Was that to your satisfaction?” Cassian asked. His wings spread boldly behind him and were it not for the bruises, I would have said he looked as good as new.

“You know damn well that was to my-”

Cassian cut me off, pressing a shaky kiss to my forehead as he laughed.

He set me down on the shore where my clothes were and let me get dressed. The old Nesta would have been surprised he didn’t try to push the moment further, but I had a feeling he could sense we were done for the day, like he knew my limits and how much I was ready for.

Another day and maybe we would go there. But right now, this was enough. He was enough. My fire, my warmth. It still scared me to pieces, but no longer enough that I felt I’d have to run all the way back to that Cauldron and demand I be remade human again.

No, maybe I could get through this. Maybe Cassian was right about everything.

Chances. I had to take chances.

It was as I was puzzling over the mixture of emotions in me that Cassian came to stand before me - fully clothed. He lifted a brow in question reading the conflicting feelings on my face. This was exactly why nothing more was happening today and I was suddenly appreciative that he understood that. So much of becoming fae was like an itch I couldn’t scratch, but some days it was better not to anyway and I was still figuring out how to tell the difference.

I didn’t know what to tell him. So I just screwed up my face and shrugged with a dopey half-smile. Cassian seemed to get it.

“Thank you,” he said.

“For what?”

“Everything? My wings. This day. _That_.” He pointed to the hot spring. I knew what _that_ he was referring to.

The look in his eyes was affectionate. Fire burned, but it was warm and soothing too. Maybe this day meant just as much to him where I was concerned as it did to me. Maybe he was lost in a hurricane too and I’d fished _him_ out.

“You’re welcome,” I said and then threw some venom back into my voice just so he knew he couldn’t get away so easily. “Now take me back and out of these hideous mountains before the sulfur ruins my hair for good.”

Cassian chuckled and grabbed my hand. “Sure thing, sweetheart.”

xx


End file.
